Sells Like Team Spirit
The New England-New York rivalry plays out regularly on baseball diamonds and football fields. But online, who wins?
We spent some time perusing the sites of the Boston Red Sox, the New York Yankees, the New England Patriots and the New York Jets. What did we find? Some striking differences — and some even more striking similarities.
Since baseball season is drawing to a close, we hit the Sox and Yankees’ sites first. The pop-up that greeted us on Boston’s page? VacationsToGo.com. Perhaps they were hoping to entice Sox fans who were looking to escape the memories of their team’s dreary season.
Considering the intensity of the New York-Boston baseball rivalry, it’s amusing to see how the two franchisesC sites mirror each other. Guess Mama Major League Baseball likes to dress all her children the same, right down to the headgear. The featured item of the day in both teams’ online stores was a black baseball hat with a black logo — hip for the Yankees, and suitable for Sox fans in post-season mourning.
From there it was off to the New England Patriots’ site. The home page included an ad inviting fans to bid on low-number Pats license plates, a very, very New England thing to covet.
Overall, the selling seemed a little less in one’s face than on the Sox or Yankees’ pages. What was a little more in one’s face was the cheerleaders’ area, which featured very “healthy” young ladies who seemed one deep breath away from a Janet Jackson episode.
And what were the featured items in the Pats’ store? A helmet candle and face stickers. We don’t get the appeal…but then again, we don’t get the appeal of football in general, aside from the excuse to eat lots of chips.
Our final destination was the site of the Patriots’ AFC rival, the New York Jets. Would it resemble the Patriots’ site in a way the teams’ baseball counterparts’ sites paralleled each other?
Not so much. In contrast to the dark, manly-man colors of the Pats’ site, the Jets’ green-and-white home page had a country club feel to it, genteel and calm.
The Jets’ online store featured a bright green Jets baseball cap. It was a nice change from basic black, and it probably looks lovely with Jets face stickers.
Go team!
